


The Drug In Me Is You

by seasons_of_supernatural



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Acting, All My Sons, Alternate Universe - High School, Awkward Tension, First Kiss, M/M, Scene Partners, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:20:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24559072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seasons_of_supernatural/pseuds/seasons_of_supernatural
Summary: Cas and Dean are scene partners. What could possibly go wrong?
Relationships: Castiel & Dean Winchester, Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 2
Kudos: 50





	The Drug In Me Is You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RaccoonInTheDaytime](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaccoonInTheDaytime/gifts).



As it turns out, being scene partners with the guy you’re desperately trying not to crush on can really activate your fight-or-flight response.

The problem with onstage chemistry, Cas has decided, is that it’s too close to real-life chemistry--romantic chemistry, sexual chemistry, call it what you will but the lines are far too blurred for Cas’s liking. The other problem is that, when asked to choose who they wanted to be paired with for the final scene of the semester, Dean, seemingly oblivious to this fact, immediately turned to Cas and said, _partners_?

Like it was that easy. Which, Cas reflects, it probably could be, if he weren’t so goddamn emotional about it.

So Dean and Cas have spent most of the past two weeks in the practice rooms together, trying to get the scene right, and Cas has both excitedly anticipated and dreaded each meeting. Fortunately, his own anxiety translated well into his character, who is arguing (well, conversing tensely, anyway) with her lover (boyfriend? Fiancé? Cas can't quite remember).

“ _He’s welcome here_ ,” Dean is saying, the picture of calm, if a bit stilted. “ _You’ve got nothing to fear from George._ ”

“ _Tell me that...just tell me that,_ ” Cas pleads, finally meeting Dean’s green eyes and feeling a sort of stinging behind his own. Is he--is Cas crying? Yes, those are tears. Cas isn’t quite sure why, and he tries to force them back but to no avail. _Use it for the scene. You’re not Castiel. You’re Ann. Castiel isn’t crying. Ann is._

“ _The man is innocent, Ann_.” Deans holds Cas’s gaze, and Cas lets Dean calm him. Suddenly, Cas understands what people mean when they talk about becoming their character; in that flash of a moment, Cas almost forgets that they’re in a practice room, not outside on Chris’s front porch. “ _Remember he was falsely accused once and it put him through hell. How would you behave if you were faced with the same thing again? Annie, believe me, there's nothing wrong for you here, believe me, kid._ ”

“ _All right, Chris_ ,” Cas says. “ _All right_.” All right.

They embrace--that’s what’s written in the script, anyway--and suddenly Cas feels so, so small, which is odd because he's only an inch shorter than Dean, but there's something so protective in the way Dean is holding him. _Five seconds for the weird hug, that’s what we decided. One. Two. Three. Four. Five._ Half of Cas wants to hold on for life and the other half is desperate to let go, to pretend his skin isn’t alive and burning where he feels Dean him.

Finally, _finally,_ Dean pulls back, and Cas should be relieved and he hates himself for being disappointed. But this is what happens. This is the part where Dean releases him, where he picks up the script and the notebook to read through and see what they’ve missed and everything goes back to normal. Because nothing was ever _not_ normal. Nothing happened. _Nothing happened._

Except Dean is still here, holding Cas by the arms with a grip gentle yet persistent, eyes locked with his. Cas takes shallow breaths, frozen in time, somehow unable to move or speak and he swears he can hear the clock stop ticking. The air feels heavy somehow, like it's got weight to it.

“Hey,” Dean whispers under the cloudy silence.

Castiel is not an idiot. He knows what comes next. He feels his heart racing and tries desperately to quiet his mind because this is _not_ a teen romance novel and what Castiel is thinking of is _not_ going to happen.

“Yeah?” It comes out as a whisper; Cas feels the air leave his lungs more than he hears himself say it. He should stop this. He should not want this. He should be ripping himself out of Dean’s arms and then they can laugh it off and go on with their day. _It’s not worth the risk, not worth ruining the friendship, it’s not worth it,_ he says to himself, over and over again.

But then Dean kisses him, and for some God-forsaken reason reason Cas lets him.

Dean shifts to hold Cas firmly by the small of his back, and Cas very much appreciates the steadiness as he kisses Dean back, soft and warm and easy and _God_ he could do this for hours, for years, forever, in that moment Cas is absolutely certain he could stay here kissing Dean for the rest of his life and never grow tired of it. Until all of a sudden the realization hits Cas like a knife to the chest.

_What the fuck have we just done?_

Cas breaks the kiss with an all too audible pop and swears to the ground, “Shit."

Dean’s expression shifts from a sort of curious satisfaction to horror, and he starts: “Wait--shit, Cas, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean--”

“No--” Cas cuts him off, bites his lip and releases it. “Don’t apologize, I--I shouldn’t have--” His thoughts are racing at a million miles a minute, one into the other into the other and Cas can’t untangle them well enough to speak. “Can we just pretend this never happened?”

Dean looks hurt, and Cas instantly regrets it. “Just--just until the scene is over,” he amends, which only serves to further confuse Dean. “I mean--can we just deal with this later? We will, I promise, but I can’t do it right now, not before we run it, I--”

“Cas,” Dean interrupts, placing a hand on Cas’s shoulder. “It's okay. It’s fine. We’ll talk about it later.”

“Okay.” Cas breathes shakily, inhaling, exhaling, and his head clears a little. “Okay.”

They run the scene--well, the scene runs itself; Cas tries to forget about the past twenty minutes, and they keep the final embrace as brief and non-awkward as possible before allowing questions from the audience of the rest of the class: are they gay or is Cas playing a girl, who’s George, what's Joe accused of and is he guilty? (Cas is a girl, George is Cas/Ann’s brother who’s coming to visit, Joe’s accused of selling faulty airplane parts and you’ll have to watch the play to find out if he’s guilty or not.) Class is over far too quickly for Cas’s liking, and it’s all he can do not to grab Dean by the arm and drag him somewhere private. As it is, a second of eye contact is all Dean needs to get the hint and follow Cas through a maze of hallways and practice rooms into the back stairwell that no one ever uses.

Dean takes a seat on the bench against the wall; Cas stays standing.. “I’m sorry,” Cas begins, and Dean opens his mouth but Cas cuts him off: “Just listen to me.”

“I’m listening,” says Dean.

Castiel has spent the past thirty minutes planning out exactly what he has to say, which is: _What happened happened, but we’re better off as friends._ He’s prepared to argue, prepared for Dean to get angry, but he knows that whatever brief, short-term altercation couldn’t possibly be worse than losing Dean, which is what's bound to happen if Cas acknowledges that he’s been waiting for that kiss for six damn months. He’s ready to explain himself, lips parted to form the words.

But what comes out is not the well-rehearsed speech but rather a blurted, “You’re my addiction.”

Dean cocks his head to the side, and Cas starts pacing because, well, shit, where does he go from here? “You’re like a drug,” he continues, a little ashamed of how he's handling the situation but it’s too late to back down it's. “I always need to be around you. I like being with you. I like talking to you. And--I liked kissing you.”

In his periphery he sees Dean’s green eyes widen, and Cas knows he should stop but the words just keep coming out like word vomit. He feels his eyes start to sting again, _no, don’t start crying now_. He forces himself to speak. “And--I care about you. And I don’t want to lose you, I’m _so_ afraid to lose you--”

“Hey.”

Cas stops pacing, turns back to face Dean, who takes Cas’s hands in his. “It’s okay,” Dean tells him, soothing. “We don’t have to do anything you want to.”

“But I _do_ want to.” Cas shakes his head, counting the tiles on the floor, and realizes the question that he still hasn’t asked Dean. “What do you want?”

“I want _you_.” Dean’s voice is low and earnest, and it makes Cas’s pulse race, head filling with mental images that should _not_ be there. “And I want you to be happy. I want you in anyway you’ll have me. I don’t care about any of that. I care about you.”

Dean Winchester is comfort. Underneath his leather jackets and bad-boy edges and machine-rough hands, he’s Castiel’s one constant. He’s loyal and dependable and stubborn, and he bottles up his traumas until you have to pry them out of him, like a window painted shut. He cares too much and tries to compensate by pretending he doesn’t care at all, except for now, Cas realizes. Because here’s Dean Winchester, Crown Prince of Not Talking About His Feelings, and he’s, well, he's talking about his feelings.

Castiel has never trusted anyone. But he forces himself to meet Dean’s gaze and reminds himself that Dean has always been there for him. He remembers sleepless nights and Dean picking up the phone on the third ring, remembers sitting on the hood of his car and looking up at the stars. Where has he ever felt safer than in the company of Dean Winchester?

Dean didn’t ask the question, but Cas answers it anyway: “I trust you.” Then he takes a deep breath, counts to three, kisses Dean and never looks back.

**Author's Note:**

> shoutout to RaccoonInTheDaytime for helping me find a scene for them to perform (from All My Sons by Arthur Miller. also! check out her work bc she's super cool and talented!)  
> hope y'all enjoyed!


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